Mon 14 Jul, 2008 05:36 am
Who knows if they'll get this in Dubuque, but they sure aren't going to like it in Chicago: This week's New Yorker cover features an image of Michelle and Barack Obama that combines every smeary right-wing stereotype imaginable: An image of Obama in a turban and robes fist-bumping his be-afro'd wife, dressed in the military fatigues of a revolutionary and packing a machine gun and some serious ammo. Oh yes, this quaint little scene takes place in the Oval Office, under a picture of Osama bin Laden above a roaring fireplace, in which burns an American flag. All that's missing is a token sprig of arugula.
The illustration, by Barry Blitt,is called "The Politics of Fear" and, according to the NYer press release, "satirizes the use of scare tactics and misinformation in the Presidential election to derail Barack Obama's campaign." Uh-huh. What's that they say about repeating a rumor?
Presumably the New Yorker readership is sophisticated enough to get the joke, but still: this is going to upset a lot of people, probably for the same reason it's going to delight a lot of other people, namely those on the right: Because it's got all the scare tactics and misinformation that has so far been used to derail Barack Obama's campaign - all in one handy illustration. Anyone who's tried to paint Obama as a Muslim, anyone who's tried to portray Michelle as angry or a secret revolutionary out to get Whitey, anyone who has questioned their patriotism�- well, here's your image.
Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton called it "tasteless and offensive" and, according to Jake Tapper at ABC, another high-profile Obama supporter called it "as offensive a caricature as any magazine could publish."
The companion article by Ryan Lizza, who has written extensively about the campaign, traces Obama's early career and rise through Chicago politics. It's very long (18 pages!) and probably won't thrill a lot of Democratic party faithful, either, since it advances the image of Obama as a skilled and calculating politician who rose by becoming a master of the game:
"[P]erhaps the greatest misconception about Barack Obama is that he is some sort of anti-establishment revolutionary. Rather, every stage of his political career has been marked by an eagerness to accommodate himself to existing institutions rather than tear them down or replace them....he has always played politics by the rules as they exist, not as he would like them to exist. He runs as an outsider, but he has succeeded by mastering the inside game."
Is it the New Yorker's job to write uniformly flattering profiles of Obama? Do they have a duty to avoid controversial imagery that plays off the most dogged and damaging campaign smears? Of course not. Still, as Tapper says, there are probably "some angry, angry people in Chicago right now." Not to mention Washington, New York, and maybe even Dubuque.
Update: Artist Barry Blitt defends the cover, saying that "It seemed to me that depicting the concept would show it as the fear-mongering ridiculousness that it is." See his full statement (and previous covers) here.
Update II: New Yorker editor David Remnick responds in our exclusive interview, calling the cover "satire" targeting not Obama, but the "absurdity" of the rumors flying about him.
See the full cover below:
Makin' It: How Chicago Shaped Obama [New Yorker]
Barry Blitt Defends His New Yorker Cover Art Of Obama [HuffPo]
David Remnick on the Cover: It's Satire [ETP
Miller and cjhsa posted this within a minute of each other. Love it. Can set your watches by the predictability.
It's Barry Blitt, it's the New Yorker, I have a hard time getting exercised. I've seen some takes that are almost convincing that it's problematic (like
this one, but I'm still shrugging for now. (Amazing how many takes I've seen on it already though. Major buzz.)
New Yorker mag's 'satire' cover draws Team Obama's ire
BY STEPHANIE GASKELL
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
Sunday, July 13th 2008, 11:08 PM
Cover of July 21 issue of The New Yorker depicts Barack and Michelle Obama in extremist roles.
Cover of July 21 issue of The New Yorker depicts Barack and Michelle Obama in extremist roles.
Barack Obama's campaign lashed out Sunday at the editors of The New Yorker magazine for a cartoon cover that depicts the Democratic candidate and his wife as fist-bumping terrorists.
The magazine's editor described the cartoon, called "The Politics of Fear," as satire. The Obama campaign called it "tasteless and offensive."
The Illinois senator is depicted in traditional Muslim garb in the Barry Blitt illustration set in the Oval Office.
His wife, Michelle, is in fatigues, sporting an Angela Davis-style sky-high Afro, an AK-47 slung over her shoulder.
A portrait of terror kingpin Osama Bin Laden hangs above the fireplace, in which an American flag is set ablaze.
"The New Yorker may think, as one of their staff explained to us, that their cover is a satirical lampoon of the caricature Sen. Obama's right-wing critics have tried to create. But most readers will see it as tasteless and offensive. And we agree," Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton said.
New Yorker editor David Remnick seemed shocked by the backlash.
"Our cover ... combines a number of fantastical images about the Obamas and shows them for the obvious distortions they are," he said in a statement.
"The burning flag, the nationalist-radical and Islamic outfits, the fist-bump, the portrait on the wall - all of them echo one attack or another. Satire is part of what we do, and it is meant to bring things out into the open, to hold up a mirror to the absurd. And that's the spirit of this cover," Remnick said.
The magazine does not explain the cover. Inside are lengthy stories that look at how Chicago politics shaped the candidate and at allegations that he flip-flops on major issues.
Obama brushed off the brouhaha. "I have no response to that," he told reporters when asked about the cover, but his supporters are infuriated.
The McCain campaign joined in piling on The New Yorker. "We completely agree with the Obama campaign that it's tasteless and offensive," said campaign spokesman Tucker Bounds.
nydailynews.com
Quote:His wife, Michelle, is in fatigues, sporting an Angela Davis-style sky-high Afro, an AK-47 slung over her shoulder.
She looks just like Cynthia McKinney
I'm waiting for Jesse Jackson to comment.
Like you, sozobe, I am not too worried about these kinds of stunts nor about the typical people who peddle it. In fact if the election season so far has told us anything; anytime this kind of thing gets going, Obama somehow comes out of it ahead. So; keep it up, miller.
boy, this race issue is a sensitive one-- i am a fan of Barry Blitt but i find this cover to be tasteless and not funny. it fails on so many levels.
Great satire designed to expose nuts like Miller for what they are. This will work in Obama's favor except with the Swift Boater vote.
That was rough by any standards.
I do think the excoriation of Miller for merely presenting the cover of the Times went a bit far, though.
I never knew Obama played in The Black Crowes.
I guess it's "smart politics" for the Obama campaign to whine and protest anything and everything that makes the candidate look in anyway bad, but it is irritating.
blueflame1 wrote:Great satire designed to expose nuts like Miller for what they are. This will work in Obama's favor except with the Swift Boater vote.
i don't think it's great satire, at all. it's offensive. Mildew may be a nut-job, but i'm not getting at how this exposes him/her as such.
white people have completely underestimated the depth of the damage done to black people-- this new yorker cover, although meant to be satire, cuts at something below the surface, unspoken.
Finn dAbuzz wrote:
The cover, titled Watch Your Back Mountain won the 2006 American Society of Magazine Editors award for Best News Magazine Cover. The ASME, in announcing the award, said that the image "evokes both the smugness of a vice president implicated in catastrophe and the cluelessness of a president incapable of stopping him".
I bet the Obama campaign didn't have a problem with this one:
i'm not getting your point here.
the top two are successful satire--
the B. Blitt cover is completely different.
If Obama was depicted in any of the ads Bush was, it wouldn't blip on my radar.
It almost seems as if the McCain campaign PAID for that. I'm sure they didn't, but this is the kind of thing that can torpedo Obama's campaign....and it is highly racial.
I'd like to know how the New Yorker is spinning this.
Gala wrote:blueflame1 wrote:Great satire designed to expose nuts like Miller for what they are. This will work in Obama's favor except with the Swift Boater vote.
i don't think it's great satire, at all. it's offensive. Mildew may be a nut-job, but i'm not getting at how this exposes him/her as such.
white people have completely underestimated the depth of the damage done to black people-- this new yorker cover, although meant to be satire, cuts at something below the surface, unspoken.
Where are the unspoken racial stereotypes in this cover?
That all blacks are muslims?
That all blacks are unpatriotic?
That all blacks support Osam bin Laden?
That black women are all gun toting militants?
This cover is satire that is not even directed at Obama.
The New Yorker is trying to get all the nutty accusations against Obama to stick?
C'mon - get serious.
Lash wrote:If Obama was depicted in any of the ads Bush was, it wouldn't blip on my radar.
It almost seems as if the McCain campaign PAID for that. I'm sure they didn't, but this is the kind of thing that can torpedo Obama's campaign....and it is highly racial.
I'd like to know how the New Yorker is spinning this.
I was wrong. I can't justify referring to it as "highly racial."
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